In the evolution of protective garments, there has been an ever pressing desire to develop stronger, lighter, thinner, more breathable and thereby more wearable garments. Such garments are intended to resist certain potentially lethal forces such as those from gun shots or stabbing types of weapons. Typically, these garments are designed to protect the wearer from ballistic or puncture forces by preventing penetration through the garment from a projectile bullet or sharp object.
However, attacking forces other than gun shots and stabbing type forces are confronted by police officers and correctional officers. For instance a blunt force may be received by an individual upon being struck across the body with blunt objects such as a bat, club, board, hand thrown projectiles and the like. Garments such as baseball type chest protectors and accessories such as riot shields have been used to fend off blunt object attacks. Unfortunately, these often leave the wearer without any appreciable ballistic or stabbing resistant protection. Moreover, certain protector devices often require the anticipation of a blunt force attack and obtainment of a shield which then must be carried by the user thereby disabling the full use of at least one hand of the user.
Attempts have been made in certain ballistic resistant articles to utilize energy absorbing layers constructed of geometric cells. However, such energy absorbing layers are typically rigid and fracturable in attempting to absorb energy from ballistic projectiles received impacting the article. Moreover, such articles typically position the layers to dissipate ballistic energy on the innermost side of the article adjacent the wearer or are fracturable layers which are sandwiched between ballistic resistant materials. Disadvantageously, the construction of these articles has not been shown to effectively protect the wearer against attacks from blunt objects. Therefore, there is a need for a garment which protects the wearer against forces from blunt objects striking against the body while also being ballistic and/or puncture resistant.